Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

The energy security of the Visegrad Group countries is a derivative of their energy potential resulting from the lack of strategic natural gas and crude oil resources, limited fuel storage capacity and limited access to the transmission network. This causes a dependence on supplies of raw materials from Russia, which is not even, but applies to each of these countries. The Czech Republic and Slovakia have small deposits of natural gas and crude oil. Hungary and Poland have greater potential, but it is still not enough to achieve energy independence. The energy market of the V4 countries is of interest to the Russian Federation, but it is not a priority for it as it accounts for a small part of Russian transmissions. Russia aims to keep the market for crude oil and natural gas at a uniform level, but the actions of the V4 countries in terms of diversification of supplies, aimed at increasing the level of energy security, effectively hinder the implementation of this goal. The threat to the energy security of the V4 countries is related to their dependence on gas supplies from Gazprom. The terms of the contracts contain unfavorable clauses that negatively affect the sale of surplus Russian gas, as it is necessary to pay fees for the ordered gas regardless of the scale of its use. The differentiation in the energy policy of the Member States is also worth noting. An example is the lack of clear opposition from the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia to the plans to expand the Nord Stream and Turkish Stream gas pipelines. These states show interest in participating in projects, which, in fact, constitute the implementation of the Russian concept of building new transmission routes. Poland takes a different position, consistently preventing the implementation of Russian energy projects.

Terrorism has been one of the most prominent issues in the last three decades. Since 2001 and the attacks on September 11, terrorism has gained a global impact. Terrorism today threatens the safety of individuals more than ever. In order to combat terrorism, countries around the world have adopted various counter-terrorism strategies. The United Kingdom is one such country. Thorugh the analysis of the United Kingdom’s counter-terrorism strategy, it’s laws and decisions from both domestic and international courts, the authors of this article aim to determine whether counter-terrorism is a sustainable measure or a violation of human rights in the United Kingdom.

Cryptocurrency market is developing fast during the past few years. Cryptocurrency now is available as a form of payment for retail goods, as an instrument for a wholesale international transaction a mean of exchange for whatever goods and is available through ATM’s. Moreover, it is developing as a possibility for fundraising a) as a private debt b) as seed capital. Companies like Facebook are discussing launching own cryptocurrency. Bank UBS is developing its blockchain based virtual currency as well. However, scientist agrees that cryptocurrency has an important impact to national security. It became a relevant instrument for illegal good transactions, a mean of exchange in the darknet and an instrument for money laundering or infrastructure for new kind of money-laundering practices (for example - “Smurfing” phenomena (EU Observer, 2019)) European Union is launching AML and KYC procedures for the cryptocurrency market. Would it be efficient? Why are we implementing KYC and AML procedures for cryptocurrency? Is it able to minimize risks?

The basis of this paper is the study of legislative acts of such counties as Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Ukrainie and Russia, related to national security, public order and interests of state prosperity in order to prevent disorders or crimes, to protect health and morality, to safeguard rights and freedoms. The objective of the paper is to assess whether the national legislation meets in this field contemporary requirements, and what are differences in comparison with the legislation of other countries. Our results show that the laws of above mentioned countries are supplemented in due time as much as possible taking into account needs and financial resources of corresponding state. The laws have also similar objectives and tasks. There are some distinctions in application of legal provisions, which, after discussion, would be usefully to introduce into normative regulations of the Republic of Latvia. The norms of law must be clearly defined; the commensurate restrictions must be appropriate for achievement of particular objective, as well as socially necessary. Moreover, the authors of the paper offer concrete proposals taking into account human rights, contemporary situation on the international scene, as well as potential of respective state institution.

Lately a lot of attention has been given to legal regulation of cybersecurity. This article will review legal regulation of cybersecurity in Lithuania. Historical retrospective of legal regulation of cybersecurity in Lithuania will be discussed, strategic Lithuanian cybersecurity documents will be analysed, and the Law on Cybersecurity of the Republic of Lithuania will be analysed and evaluated. After a comparative analysis of cybersecurity strategies and laws and a review of legal regulation of cybersecurity in Lithuania, gaps of law-making and of other measures were distinguished, and corresponding conclusions were made. The adoption of the new Law on Cybersecurity, which regulates many important institutes, is evaluated positively. But with regard to the current legal regulation on cybersecurity in Lithuania additional measures are necessary (functions of institutions that formulate cybersecurity policy and perform control functions have not been detailed and distinguished, also functions of the Lithuanian national Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) are not foreseen in the Law on Cybersecurity, etc.).